


Permanent Ink

by Waldo



Category: NCIS
Genre: F/M, Tattoos, datefic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-05-02
Updated: 2009-05-02
Packaged: 2017-10-04 02:46:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 514
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waldo/pseuds/Waldo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Abby studied Tim in the flickering light of the candle. While neither of them were thinking of moving in together anytime soon, advice on a tat was pretty serious. Ink was personal, intimate. And permanent."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Permanent Ink

**Author's Note:**

> Bat 17 actually exists in Evanston, IL exactly as depicted here. (To my ever-loving amusement, they have a sandwich called "The Captain Jack") This was written for the completely screwed over fifth round of "NCIS_LFWS" on LJ. The prompt was one slash and one het story, 500 words or less each. We had to use one of five given quotes as the inspiration for both stories. I chose, "He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains a fool forever." (Chinese proverb) This is (obviously) my het entry.

Tim had researched for three days until he found Bat 17. It was in an incongruous stripmall, but it was the ideal third date place for Abby and him. It was just a jazzed-up sandwich shop, but it was a vampire-and-bat-themed sandwich shop.

Abby had been ecstatic when they'd pulled up. She'd giggled over the menu selections like "The Bat out of Hell" burger and the Voo-Doo salmon dish.

Feeling confident that he was doing things right and that things were going well, Tim took Abby's hand. "I have a question for you."

Abby's smiled. "Okay…"

"Well, see, I lied to Tony about something."

"And he caught you?"

"Not yet. Well, if he ever believed me in the first place. See, when I first asked him to introduce us, he told me you wouldn't be into a guy who's, well… as boring as me."

Abby scowled. "I'll be sure to have a few four-letter words with him tomorrow about how narrow-minded he thinks I am."

"Yeah, well, he implied that if I got a tattoo you might be more interested."

"Timmy, that's so not necessary. I like you the way you are. You're the only person I've met outside of forensics seminars that I can talk DNA tertiary structure with and not have their eyes cross. You're plenty interesting." Abby patted his hand affectionately.

McGee smiled and Abby could see a faint blush creep up from under his collar. "I was kind of hoping you'd say something like that. All the same… I'm thinking of getting some art done and the last thing I need is for this to get done badly. I figured you'd know someone."

Abby flipped over both arms, showing off her various designs and then canted her head to show off the spiderweb. "You figure correctly. What are you gonna get?"

"Well, that's the other thing I was going to ask your advice on. I've googled a ton of stuff, but none of it really seemed me, you know?"

Abby studied Tim in the flickering light of the candle. While neither of them were thinking of moving in together anytime soon, advice on a tat was pretty serious. Ink was personal, intimate. And permanent.

They both sat thinking for a minute, finally Abby asked, "What's important to you?"

"NCIS."

Abby smirked. "I'd suggest you have your badge tattooed on your ass, but that might cause complications when you're undercover."

"If I'm undercover and someone's seeing my ass, things have already gotten 'complicated'."

She giggled for a minute at that mental image, but then Abby's eyes suddenly got wide. She grabbed a cocktail napkin and folded it into a strip. She dug a pen out of her bag and began sketching.

Tim looked at what she'd drawn; it would need fine-tuning by the tattoo artist, but the concept was brilliant. She'd drawn a computer chip twisted around like a strand of DNA. His biomedical degree tied in with his computer forensics.

Tim leaned across the table and kissed her. "You'll come with me?"

Abby grinned, "Wouldn't miss it for the world."


End file.
